[fear]platinum - April 20, 2004

Author: JoE, ZachRL
Version: 2.0 revision 1
Reviewed by: Steve Streza
User Rating:  66%
Well. Now for something completely different. [fear]platinum strives for a totally foreign look to your Mac, and tries to make it devoid completely of color. It's ultimate goal: look like a black and white horror film from years ago. Does it pull it off?

Aesthetics
[f]p is an interesting and mixed bag. On one hand, it features some excellent graphics and images that come together for a GUI. On the other hand, what is lacks is definition and contrast, and as a result, [f]p can be somewhat difficult to see.

However, the widgets are stylin'. Very, very detailed and unique. This is definitely not an Aqua rehash. Everything from sliders to scroll bars got some kind of update. And it doesn't look bad at all. Everything is very well designed and easy to understand. The window backgrounds look like physical wallpaper circa 1950s. I love it. It's quite a masterpiece and really helps pull off the spooky-movie-from-years-of-yore motif. That notwithstanding, some of this stuff is pretty much the same hat you've worn before. Sliders, tabs, checkboxes, and editable text fields all look pretty much like white Aqua.

Of all the beautiful widgetry that is applied in this theme, I'd have to say that my favorites are buttons, progress bars, and surprisingly, the blank windows. Windows have beautiful backgrounds and look very nice. Progress bars just look cool with their sliding vertical bars. And buttons are very slick and demonstrate their function perfectly. I'm very impressed.

Usability
As I said before, [f]p is quite unique in terms of how it looks. It's been far too long since we've had such a different theme grace our desktops. That having been said, that says nothing about how usable it is, and that's really where a theme needs to play it's cards. Unfortunately, [f]p has some definite issues which need to be addressed before it becomes something I could use for more than 10 minutes.

First and probably most notably, there is a total and definite lack of contrast. This makes it tough to differentiate between elements sometimes. For instance, its difficult to tell just by glancing where the indicator on a scroll bar is. It's also sometimes difficult to tell which widgets are inactive and which are active simply because of the partial translucency not being indicative enough. That's even more prevalent in the round buttons.

Furthermore, I just don't like some things. Menus, for instance, need some work, and therefore, distract. Dividers draw far too much of the viewer's attention, owing to their tremendous thickness and darkness. Checkboxes and radio buttons are just dead boring. All of this stuff just generally detracts from the UI experience and restrains me from using this for very long.

Extras
[fear] includes an impressive array of extras. Which apps are skinned is a tidbit of info that wasn't documented, so I'll merely assume they're there. (And yes, they are.) However, there are plenty of other niceties. Let's start with icons. There is a full iContainer that contains beautiful icons that replaces everything. There are also another 23 miscellaneous icons that there weren't available to put in the CandyBar package. Next, cursors. There are three MightyMouse cursor sets, including one that makes all of your mouse pointers into knives. How cool is that? Finally, graphics. There is a BootX image to replace the Apple logo during startup, almost a dozen wallpapers, and a few backgrounds for the Finder window and iChat window. Quite an impressive bevy of images, and I couldn't find anything missing to complete the effect.

Posted by stevestreza on April 20, 2004 | Comments (20)

Comments

Posted by TwisterMc at April 20, 2004 09:58 AM | Edit | Delete

I thought this theme was very usable.

Posted by Chris McElligott at April 20, 2004 10:13 AM | Edit | Delete

This theme is oh so interesting. Its definately most unique theme there is to date. Most thing I'm not a fan of is the menu dividers. Apart from that this is damn nice :)

Posted by MrShowtime at April 20, 2004 10:56 AM | Edit | Delete

I'm actually a big fan of this theme. It has a very tim burtonish/American McGee's Alice feel to it. And I found it very usable. Personally, the theme is on both my tower and my powerbook. Nice work.

Posted by NetworkShadow at April 20, 2004 11:48 AM | Edit | Delete

The 8.4 looks really strange under that 10. And 6.2 usability is a bit low, it's really a very usable theme... I think 9.0 would have been a more realistic rating for it.

Posted by hipstertrash at April 20, 2004 12:02 PM | Edit | Delete

to network shadow- 8.4 would be the average of the first 3 numbers.. hence being an "overall" score. heh. anyways.. i love this theme, ive been a fan since the first version, there are a few little kinks here and there, but im certain with the next version it will tweaked to perfection

Posted by JoE950 at April 20, 2004 01:30 PM | Edit | Delete

Ok.. Why do people keep leaving Zach out? I tried to give him a ton of credit, but its just not sticking is it? WELL THIS BETTER!

This theme's level of awe stroking woudln't have been possible without the help of ZachRL.

While he is only credited with the creation of the extras and being single (ladies, this is a damn shame!), he also helped a ton with the theme, keeping me on track and keeping my laziness minimal. Such things as, the metal window corner bands, the background textures on the aqua windows, and mounds of other things, would have been left out if I hadn't taken any of his advice..

Now on to the review. Well done. Not sure about the usability score, but its an opinion and so on. But wheres the extras score? [f]p murders you with extras, yet somehow that stopped being a factor all of the sudden... There's a friggin phone theme for crying out loud.. ? I want my damn points, or should I say Zach's points..? yes, yes I should. I suppose I will discuss this more on aim with Phill, since I don't want to whine about it in public hehe!

Posted by Phillip Ryu (Panel) at April 20, 2004 01:36 PM | Edit | Delete

The extras score is now wrapped into Reviewer's Weight, due to a lot of flaming about it's undue weight. That would be why Steve gave fear a weight of 10. :)

PS, I love the packaging. That was very cool.

Posted by Steve Streza at April 20, 2004 03:23 PM | Edit | Delete

To everyone who reads this: this is definitely not Aqua, and as a result, people will have highly mixed feelings about this. Some people will love it, some will hate it, just because it's so unique. Caveat emptor.

Oh, and JoE, I loved the extras and I would've given extras a ten if it still existed, but it doesn't, so I just made RW a 10. :D

Posted by wibs at April 20, 2004 03:36 PM | Edit | Delete

Underrated overall score. This theme raises the technical bar the same was that DXB did.

that said, the square right side of popup buttons sticks out to me like a sore thumb and really bugs me. my only real issue with a beautiful theme.

Posted by paularms at April 20, 2004 05:51 PM | Edit | Delete

I agree that the usability score is just too low.

The review was extremely nit-picky about the menu dividers.

I agree that there is quite a low contrast, but that's what makes it great. Everything is subtle, yet very unique. It's a very nice "middle-grey" theme to use. That is much needed for those of us that work with color constantly and need to pick out all of the subtle differences between everything.

Also, I feel that the usability score is too low because all of the elements are unique in the sense that it is easy to establish the difference between them. Fonts don't disappear like in JetBlack. Hi-lights on menu items for mouse overs are VERY noticeable.

I would have given it at least an 8.5 for usability.

Posted by goober at April 20, 2004 08:23 PM | Edit | Delete

10.0 Reviewer's Weight: "Finally, a really unique, non-Aqua theme"

as opposed to what...a really unique aqua theme?

i'm confused and i think whoever reviewed this is too.

Posted by Heiesuke at April 20, 2004 09:06 PM | Edit | Delete

I love this theme!!! You're right about it not being useful for intense professional computing but it's so sweet i use it anyway. great job I was waiting for this update to 10.3 for a long time.

Posted by Steve Streza at April 21, 2004 03:17 PM | Edit | Delete

goober: Yes, a really unique, yet Aqua theme might be something like Aluminum Alloy or jet Black. Both are really different and unique, but both are Aqua at the core. [fear] isn't Aqua at all, and offers a unique take on the skin of the Mac and on other works - this has never, ever been done before. :)

Posted by Dave at April 23, 2004 09:05 PM | Edit | Delete

Not bad. Much more usable than I thought it would be. Personally, I don't care for it very much, but that's just because it's a bit ornate for me.

Posted by Mat at April 24, 2004 04:49 PM | Edit | Delete

I watched this theme slowly but surely come alive, and its definitely one of the cooler things you can do to your Mac, even if it is just to freak out people who sit at it. :)

I love it because its out there. It doesn't hide the fact its different, and that arrogance to be different is sorely missing from many themes.

Posted by BlackDog at September 8, 2004 10:13 AM | Edit | Delete

[F[p 3 is so much better im beta testing it right now

Posted by BlackDog at September 8, 2004 10:13 AM | Edit | Delete

[F[p 3 is so much better im beta testing it right now

Posted by Aeryn at December 20, 2004 12:42 PM | Edit | Delete

I really like this theme. I'm using it right now on my PB, fits right in with the rest of the packaging just by looking at it. Only thing I kind of have hard time using is the folder icons which looked quite white and indistinguishable at times, but the rest of the theme is designed beautifully. I love the desktop wallpapers.

Posted by outsider at February 4, 2006 08:12 AM | Edit | Delete

mieszkania Warszawa, ogłoszenia nieruchomości, projektowanie stron, tworzenie stron, agencja reklamowa, reklama w internecie

Posted by git at February 4, 2006 11:44 AM | Edit | Delete

zdrowa żywność, psycholog, nauka angielskiego, soczewki kontaktowe, psyche sf, jk, ns, projektowanie wnętrz, hydraulik, opcat, domy opieki, freetimes, jidds, fabrykapoe, sfworks, polskepoeje, pb, pp, jk, wypadki, opony, agroturystyka, klimatyzacja, apteka, dentysta, fs, kray, eway, angs, gits, akupunktura, sw, sf, puz

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